Minds are like cars—when kept in neutral, they’ll always roll backwards, downhill.

You’ve likely heard the adage, “Use it or lose it”. Whether it’s our physical muscles or brain “muscles”, they naturally atrophy from lack of exercise. To make sure that doesn’t happen, I’d go one step farther and say, “Build it or lose it.” Why?

First, maintenance by itself tends to be boring. By definition, there’s nothing new. Maintaining means continuing to do whatever we’ve done before. That becomes repetitive, and therefore boring, because we’re not learning or developing in any way.

Second, due to the above, we lose motivation. We know we should maintain and do upkeep, but without anything interesting to look forward to or vision to draw us in, we lack enough “why”. With no reason to “put our brains in gear” and use them, we’ll stay in neutral. Going back to the car analogy—if we have nowhere we want to go and no reason to get there, we’re not going to put our car in “drive”. Likewise, we need a strong reason to learn a new skill and knowledge.

How, then, do we stay motivated to “keep our brain in gear” and develop it in new ways? Like any muscle development, that’s not comfortable or easy. It takes energy and effort, and often perseverance when we feel like giving up.

1. Begin with a growth mindset—Decide that learning, stretching, and expanding our comfort zone is worth it for its own sake. It gives us more ability to contribute to any group or organization we’re part of, improves relationships, makes us feel better about ourselves and life. It’s good for our health—prevents dementia, keeps us mentally fit, and even physically fit as our energy use keeps us from becoming sluggish.

“An intelligent heart acquires knowledge, and the ear of the wise seeks knowledge.” Prov. 18:15

“Let the wise hear and increase in learning…” Prov. 1:5

The best way to grow is in the Lord, since He’s the source of all wisdom and ability.

“But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” 2 Pet. 3:18

2. Add a specific vision—“If I learn/develop/accomplish this, it will… (the benefit)”. For example, I love learning foreign languages—that’s because I love to get to know and communicate with people in and from other cultures. But, when we lived in other countries, I focused on learning that particular language, because that’s the one I needed. Other ones are great, but they weren’t relevant in that situation or place. For you, this learn-for-the-sake-of principle may apply to certain tech. skills, people skills, mechanical skills, etc.

If nothing else, we have the highest, ultimate goal of mind-renewal for transformation, which makes us better than the world, and brings eternal benefit.

“Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.” Rom. 12:2

3. Put #1 and 2 together for the stuff that doesn’t fit our natural interest or “bent”. Thankfully we can go to the Lord for help with these areas that don’t come naturally for us:

“If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him.” James 1:5

That help might come directly through a lightbulb-type realization, or it may come through another person. Such as my friend in college who helped me understand the material in our genetics course. When the book didn’t make sense and the professor’s lectures were even more confusing, I’d ask her. The Lord enabled her to explain things to me in ways I could understand and enabled me to understand it. My vision for learning the material came from needing to keep my GPA up, for the sake of…(you get it). Why was I even in a genetics course with mostly pre-med majors, graded on a curve? Because it fulfilled my math and science requirements in our liberal-arts college and was more interesting than other math classes. Sometimes life requires us to learn that which we’d rather not!

For example, technology and all its frequent changes and advances. Many of us, myself included, aren’t naturally “tekkie”s. But working online since 2011 has motivated me, out of necessity, to learn a lot of tech-skills, to the point where I even help some younger people solve tech issues (especially during COVID). Talk about a fun boost to self-esteem! Yes, I do still get help from my son for the way-too-hard stuff, but since he went to college and got married, I know I can’t depend on him!

The point here is, keep going and growing even in the hard stuff. Yes, there are friends and sons to help us learn, but it’s better to have that knowledge and skill ourselves for when we need it, especially when the need is immediate and/or others aren’t available.

If none of those positive motivations help, ask yourself if you really want to lose your chance to contribute, your ability to solve problems, or anything else we lose when our brains atrophy, rolling backwards, downhill. It’s easier to keep going forward than it is to climb back uphill!